tomcat & Java 5 rant

So I go over to Jakarta this morning to get the latest stable Tomcat. Spend some time, as usual, browsing through the bewildering array of choices, until I find that the latest stable version if 5.5.4. But wait! There's also 5.0.30! Both seem to be parts of branches that are currently maintained. So what's the difference?

5.5.4 is compiled against Java 5. So to run it under JDK 1.4.x, you need a special "binary compatibility package". Do you want to bet that the 5.0.x branch is going to get less attention now that the 5.5.x branch allows Tomcat devs to play with the latest language toys?

This is not just a Jakarta issue, btw. Java 5 naturally breaks compatibility in several areas. Yeah, yeah, I know. Evolution of the language and all that. But, I don't know, I'd much prefer it if I could choose when to migrate, rather than have the choice eventually forced on me because good open-source projects start to migrate as well. Bleh.